Dancing in the No-Fly Zone: A Woman's Journey through Iraq (review)

Dancing in the No-Fly Zone:A Woman’s Journey through Iraq Nadje Al-Ali Hadani Ditmars. Northhampton, MA: Olive Branch Press, 2005. 256 pages. ISBN 1-56656-634-7. In the midst of a flurry of publications on Iraq by journalists, politicians, diplomats, and academics, Hadani Ditmars' work undoubtedly stands out. Her book is not only engaging, interesting, original, and perceptive, but she has clearly done her homework. The book is full of information that provides the reader with a historical context and insight into the human cost of sanctions and war. Yet it is not just a book about misery. Dancing in the No-Fly Zone is about people pursuing art, culture, music, and entertainment despite economic deterioration, repression, and later on, war and occupation. Ditmars' book is also the story of a return. The Canadian journalist of Lebanese origin first visited Iraq in 1997. By that time Iraq had already been subjected to seven years of the most comprehensive sanctions regime ever inflicted on a country, in addition to the ongoing political repression by the regime of Saddam Hussein. After her initial trip, Ditmars traveled to Iraq on numerous occasions, writing for the New York Times, the Independent, the Globe and Mail, and Newsweek, in addition to broadcasting for CBC and BBC. In September 2003, six months after the invasion, the journalist returned to Iraq to find out what happened to her friends and the various people she had met on previous visits. Throughout the book Ditmars compares the situation and her experiences during earlier visits to the rapidly changing situation since the invasion. [End Page 128] Her stories about the sanctions period go against the grain of most existing literature: Ditmars does not merely write about the deteriorating infrastructure, health conditions, and poverty, although she refers to them. But she manages to provide insight into a dynamic and vibrant cultural scene, describing, for example, visits to the theater to see extremely popular plays, parties with friends, and dancing in the Al-Rasheed Hotel, or one of her best friends playing in the National Orchestra. In 2003, some new cultural and social spaces and opportunities seem to be opening up for her friends, and many people she talks to welcome the changes. However, most of what she describes points to a deterioration in daily living conditions and the author detects trends and developments related to the lack of security and the violence and corruption that have escalated tremendously since her last visit. As Ditmars tries to trace the steps of artists, actors, musicians, businessmen, even her former government minder, we sense her disappointment, waning enthusiasm, and increasing fear as the security situation worsens. The journalist visits her friends' houses, restaurants, churches, hospitals, theaters, prisons, ministries, and the infamous Green Zone. She is searching for visual metaphors of the new Iraq—Baghdad streets lined with death shrouds announcing the names of the recently deceased, mere yards from advertisements for the latest satellite dishes; the music and ballet school enclosed by barbed wire and bordered by an endless line of Iraqi soldiers waiting for their pay from American Marines; barefoot children leading looted race horses through traffic jams; and the mural of 26-year-old Esam Pasha painted over a portrait of Saddam Hussein (197). The mural, in Ditmars' words, "was a tame ode to the treasures of 'old Baghdad.' Buildings from the city's glorious past declared themselves in Disneyesque forms and fantasia-like colors. At best, it was decorative. At worst, it was irrelevant" (198). Esam Pasha, whose claims to be the grandson of Nuri al-Said, the prime minister under King Faisal II, are hotly disputed by Iraqi intellectuals, has become one of the symbols of the "new Iraq." Elevated to the status of an important Iraqi artist by the Western media, Esam proudly says, "the soldiers love my work" (198), but he has little credibility among established Iraqi artists and intellectuals inside or in the diaspora. As a social anthropologist trained in research ethics, and also being of Iraqi origin, I had to cringe several times as Ditmars described, quite [End Page 129] openly and without any sense of shame, lying about her professional identity...

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